Life of a footy fan I suppose. It does not appear our lad is playing hungry anymore. I would no longer call him a willing defender. He needs to have some time watching from the sideline and find his passion again.
This is a clear case of a coach lowering the team to his level. It might be familiar to our USMNT followers from U17 on up.
The Austrian Sam Allardyce will have them playing bunker and long balls by the end of the season. The plus is they're unlikely to lose the game at the Allianz by much.
I rarely agree with this guy but agreed. Stoeger has taken a top 15 offensive team and turned them into a one dimensional worker bee team. It’s like he doesn’t know how to play with nice toys. Defensively they are a bit more solid but at the cost of creativity and explosiveness.
BvB desperately need Tuchel to come back, and Pulisic even needs Tuchel more This BvB has fallen off a cliff and is just plain ugly to watch.
I think if BVB are just hoping this season ends. However, if they don't at least qualify for CL - they'll have a hard time recruiting scouts, a manager and decent players for the upcoming season. I think it is time to say, "Thanks, Watzke and good-bye."
I propose an alternative. The team doesn't seem to like the new coach, new system or their roles. Pulisic's role has clearly changed since break. BVB is broken. This happens all the time in sports where a team's environment looks toxic.
They need a coach that has the Dortmund DNA from the Klopp era imo, they have drifted much too far from the blueprint that made them successful. Maybe there is a qualified coach on the inside that could be promoted? From the USA/Pulisic side, everything sucks, even our one shiny bright spot is at its dimmest.
Yeah, I didn't see the game today, but the Stoger appointment always seemed like a move designed to stop the bleeding, limp to a quasi-respectable finish this year, and then do some serious re-tooling over the summer. As you say, though, they might fail to meet even that minimal expectation.
Dortmund is a mess, and needs a huge rebuild. If you look at their starters today, they really aren't that talented. Most of their defenders are mediocre, and their midfielders so average. Aubameyang and pulisic are their two most dangerous attacking players, but the mediocrity around them and schemes their coaches have employed this year have made them less dangerous. Dortmund wasted so much money on Goetze (decent, but not worth what they paid), yarmelenko, and schurrle. I honestly think it's in both cp's and bvb's best interests for him to leave this summer so they can flip their roster, and he can find a manager who knows what he is doing.
I don't think it is so much our boy as the scheme and what is left at BVB. They are really at a cross roads. If this guy is defensive minded, what happened on the first goal tying goal? At least I was not the only one not liking what the team has become. But it is a team and half of them need to go. sounds familiar.
BvB and Bayern are after 16 year old Feyenoordkid. Just when at last most kids begin to understand going to the shit epl academies isnot a good start, the Germans start the Kindergartenraub. Develop your own talents.
I don't think anyone expects Stoeger to stay beyond this summer - or do you mean Pulisic? If Nagelsman comes in, it could be beautiful. Why would he leave? Its one bad season.
I mean Pulisic. In my opinion, the manager is only part of the problem. I think their roster is really not all that talented, and the pieces don't fit together well. They need a major rebuild, and could use the funds from a cp sale to fix 3-4 positions. I think it will take 2-3 years to get them back to where they want to be, even if they nail the next coaching hire. I don't think cp wants to stick around for that when a team like liverpool would happily take him right now, and give him a nice raise, most likely.
Dortmund is not that far off if healthy and the right coach. I even think Auba could be replaced in the summer. They need Sahin, Rode, Castro, and Schurrle out, Subotic is already gone. I would sell Gotze too.So on defense they need a keeper and a left back that can stay healthy, IIRC Toljan actually plays right back, and the back line is fine for now with or without Bartra. Weigl has to start and Dahoud can give him a bit of a rest now and again. Get Phillipe and Reus back and the offense looks good enough. Could use a striker if Auba goes. Sancho and Pulisic are pretty good, Isak needs games and he looks as if he will come good too. Yarmo has his uses even if one footed. With the right coach, a Tedesco or Nagelsman type, they would be fine. Fine as in a champions league qualifier, and with a bit of luck, a knock out level team. They may be a couple of seasons out from title challenges, but it will always be thus for a team like them. After the type of season he has had that is about the level of team he will land at. He may find his options are akin to out of the frying pan into the fire.
obviously, there is no way to know, but it's pretty standard for guys who aren't playing champions league to want to move to a club that has it. It's also pretty standard for guys to want a pay raise when it's available. Couple those factors with klopp being a proven commodity, and having a prior relationship with cp, and nagelsmann being a complete unknown for a club with bvb's ambitions, and there is plenty of reason to think cp would want out.
they don't just need those midfielders out, they need to also replace them. Same thing with aubameyang. we are talking at least 5-6 guys who started yesterday who need to be replaced. that takes money and time.
If BvB are so high on a young, charismatic tactician they should have stuck with the better one. Teuchy is a better coach than Naggy and certainly for the BvB style.
Wanting out is half of the equation. CP does not want too many outings where he looks lost. I get that Dortmund is not at it´s best right now, but Kagawa looked like a threat throughout despite. Every player has slumps. Every player has systems that don´t suit him. But watching that how often were you thinking, ooo, they should have seen Pulisic´s run there... His movement looked like that of a dancer trying to remember the steps, and it´s always been so natural.
Just a bit more time, the team getting used to Stöger boring tactics, and we may see CP hit the rivals hard in the counter. It's basically a race between him getting the new system & the results pushing the coaching staff to bench him. Puli moments of brilliance, even if they lead to nothing, are good enough to extend the rope a bit. Also, today, he was part of the first goal sequence: Castro to Pulisic to Piszczek who shoots, but rebounds off a sweeping Soyuncu, then off Koch, goes high and Kawaga catches it in the air perfectly. So a quaternary assist, I guess.